For the long Easter weekend, some friends and I went to stay in a remote cabin in the Canadian forest with no running water, no TV and no internet. We were looking forward to getting some fresh air and spending plenty of time outside. Unfortunately, the weather had other ideas and for two out of the four days, it was pouring with rain. So how do you amuse yourself when the weather doesn’t entice you to venture outside? Here are some of the things my friends and I did to occupy ourselves without ‘mod cons’ (modern conveniences).
1. Card games
Having a deck of playing cards can bring hours of entertainment! I learnt some new card games whilst we sheltered from the rain, including ‘President’, ‘Cheat’ and a take on the game ‘UNO’. Additionally, I was able to teach my friends one of my favourite card games, ‘Chase the Ace’, which is very easy to get the hang of. Perhaps you know these games by other names or with slightly different rules.
2. Hunt the thimble
This is a game I always used to play with my grandmother. One player hides a thimble (a small cap that you place over your finger to protect it whilst sewing) or another small object in a room, while the other players stay outside. The other players then return to the room and look for the object. The player who hid the thimble can give clues or say ‘hot’ or ‘cold’ depending on how close the players are to the object. The person who finds the item first wins and gets to hide it for the next round.
3. Board games
Board games are great at helping pass the time on a rainy day. We played Cluedo, the murder mystery game where players have to deduce which character committed the crime, with which weapon and in which room. There are many other board games you could try too: Monopoly, Battleships, Pictionary, Jenga and Scrabble are some popular ones.
4. Consequences
This is a game with the potential to be very amusing. All you need is a pen and piece of paper for each person in the group. Then get writing! Everyone writes the beginning of a story on their sheet of paper. Then it is passed to the next person in the circle, who writes the next word or sentence. The paper is folded so that only the most recent phrase can be seen before being passed again to the next player, who writes the next line and so on. After ten sentences have been written, the full narratives are revealed and usually there will be some funny stories to make you laugh!